Anish Kapoor performs a mass Gangnam Style video in support of Ai Weiwei, the Chinese artist and dissident whose parody of Psy’s viral video was banned in China. Stars many major players from the international arts establishment.

*

Feeling quite fortunate myself, picked up this watch recently in the 50c basket at the Red Cross. Grand.
Needs a new battery, that’s all. If not, no great loss. I’ll probably wear it anyway.
Nixon is another family name, and ’tis the Emerald Green Pantone colour of the year. Or close enough.

And lastly some little gems of wisdom from the Emerald Isle and Huffington Post

Like this:

and this piece from Memphis, a souvenir from Gracelands, have in common?
Not so much. Considering the post-modern Milan-originated movement [1981-1985] had nothing to do with the city of Memphis, or The King or blue suede shoes.

But Kitschness? Yes. After decades of modernist doctrine, the Memphis group liberated themselves from the confines of smart, but soulless ‘good taste’ in design. They experimented with uncoventional materials, historic forms, kitsch geometric motifs and gaudy colours.

EttoreSottsass, the leader of Memphis design was ‘quoting from suburbia’. ‘Memphis is not new, Memphis is everywhere.’

Like the polarising Memphis movement, where you were either for it, or against it, Mrs Mia Wallace [Uma Thurman] in a deleted scene from Pulp Fiction, makes a similar definitive statement: you are either an Elvis person or a Beatles person.

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Although I’m a massive John Lennon fan, I think it’s fair to say I’ve been influenced by the latter Memphis King from an early age. Uh-huh, that’s me. Rock on fat baby girl Elvis. Sadly I lost the shock of black hair…

But I do have some blue suede shoes [full size too], my second pair as someone souvenired the first ones on a film shoot. Rude.
You can do anything but lay off of my blue suede shoes…

I hope I didn’t bore you too much with my life story.Elvis Presley

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So what kind of person are you? And what do you think of that tea set?
Thank you, thank you very much…

[A sample of some items on my new website. Coming soon, if I can stop fussing.]

So it rains, and rains, and now its autumn here in Sydney.

Stay gold, Ponyboy. Stay gold…The Outsiders Pg 107

[This weekend we are the Insiders!]

If you haven’t read S.E. Hinton’s teenage masterpiece [or seen the 80’s heartthrob-filled-to-the-max movie than I guess I’ve lost you.]

Let me just say I was in LOVE with Ponyboy. Totally. Was crazy about this book, must have read it 10 times, the story, the characters, the cover, the lot. I am ashamed to say I pretended to lose this copy and never returned it to the school library.

I am sure I paid a fine but as the crazy Muscle Man from Regular Show says [lost you again?] It was worth it!

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What a guy! [Not Muscle Man, lets be clear, though we’ve seen plenty of him this weekend too.]

Ponyboy Curtis. Sensitive, sunset loving track and field star who was tuff looking but soft and soulful on the inside. Be still my 14 year old heart. No wonder. SE Hinton was a 16 year old chick. And boy did she nail it.

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One morning I woke up earlier than usual. Johnny and I slept huddled together for warmth – Dally had been right when he said it would get cold where we were going. Being careful not to wake Johnny up, I went to sit on the steps and smoke a cigarette.The dawn was coming then. All the lower valley was covered with mist, and sometimes little pieces of it broke off and floated away in small clouds. The sky was lighter in the east, and the horizon was a thin golden line. The clouds changed from gray to pink, and the mist was touched with gold. There was a silent moment when everything held its breath, and then the sun rose. It was beautiful.

‘Golly’—Johnny’s voice beside me made me jump—’that sure was pretty.’
Yeah.’ I sighed, wishing I had some paint to do a picture with while the sight was still fresh in my mind. ‘The mist was what was pretty,’ Johnny said. ‘All gold and silver.’ ‘Uhmmmm,’ I said, trying to blow a smoke ring. ‘Too bad it couldn’t stay like that all the time.’ ‘Nothing gold can stay.’
I was remembering a poem I’d read once.
‘What?’

‘Nature’s first green is gold, Her hardest hue to hold. Her early leaf’s a flower; But only so an hour. Then leaf subsides to leaf, So Eden sank to grief, So dawn goes down to day Nothing gold can stay.’

The Outsiders Pg 59

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I’m going to go out on a limb here and say to you Mr Robert Frost that some gold things can stay. My wedding ring for one.
This concept had been unfurling in my mind for a few days, and then yesterday I stumbled on a box of these 1970’s gems at my local Red Cross. Lightbulb.
18 of them for $10. Gold! And yes they will one day crumble to dust but for now, it’s craft time…

Who am I kidding? I haven’t done any craft, though I should like to.

It’s on the list. I saw these cute felt like playtime tea bags and cookies at Koskela recently. And it did occur to me that such a great yet simple idea could in fact be done by me at home. But then I thought, for $18
a] it won’t actually happen and
b] I should really give credit and support to the clever and hard working somebodies who created and put these products out there.
So I have more time to sit down and admire them with these sunny Corning mugs and my little girl. Guilt free too.

…I’ve been thinking about it, and that poem, that guy that wrote it, he meant you’re gold when you’re a kid, like green.When you’re a kid everything’s new, dawn. It’s just when you get used to everything that it’s day…